Aula· Spain, city by cityCataluña
Lleida
«Lleida destaca por la Seu Vella, una catedral en una colina.»Lleida stands out for the Seu Vella, a cathedral on a hill.
Lleida is the capital of the only Catalan province without access to the sea, in an agricultural plain irrigated by the Segre and cultivated with fruit. It is dominated by the Seu Vella, the medieval cathedral on the hill, which in 1707 was requisitioned as a barracks and returned to worship only in the mid-twentieth century.
Did you know
Cathedral was a barracks for centuries.
The Seu Vella was converted into a military barracks in the eighteenth century and remained under army control for over two centuries.
How they talk in Lleida
The western Catalan of Lleida retains vowels and forms different from the Catalan of Barcelona; «lo» as an article can appear in traditional speech. «Ponent» is the word used to indicate the Catalan west and the Lleida area.
déu-n'hi-do
Not bad; quite something; truly remarkable. Interjection or adverb to express surprise, admiration, importance, or a considerable quantity.
Everyday life in Lleida
The «fruticultores» in June
Around the city there are kilometres of peach and nectarine trees, and thousands of seasonal workers arrive for the harvest. In those months the landscape, the traffic and the bars in the area change completely.
«En junio se recoge la fruta.» — In June the fruit is harvested.
The «Seu Vella» above everything
The old cathedral stands on a hill that dominates the city and for two centuries it was a barracks: you go up on foot or by the inclined lift, and you go there to watch the sunset over the plain.
«Subimos a la Seu Vella.» — We go up to the Seu Vella.
The cold with the fog
In winter the plain fills with a low fog that doesn't lift for days, and it is called «boira»: temperatures stay below zero and the villages above three hundred metres stay in the sun looking at it from outside.
«Hoy hay niebla todo el día.» — Today there is fog all day.
What to eat in Lleida
Cargols a la llauna
Snails roasted in a tray with garlic, oil and paprika, eaten with a toothpick.
Coca de recapte
Thin flatbread with roasted vegetables on top, often with anchovies or sausage.
Fideus rossejats
Short pasta toasted and cooked in broth, served dry with alioli.
Festivals in Lleida
Aplec del Caragol
the last weekend of May
The «colles» camp at the Camps Elisis and cook tonnes of snails: two hundred thousand people for three days.
What to see in Lleida
Seu Vella
The cathedral on the hill, with the cloister in front of the church instead of to the side.
La Suda
The fortress around the Seu Vella, with the remains of the Muslim governors' palace.
Catedral Nova
The new cathedral, neoclassical, built down below when the old one was requisitioned.
Parc de la Mitjana
The poplar wood along the Segre, with paths and water birds.
Where Lleida comes from
A cathedral used as a barracks
Iberian era
Iltirta
Ilergete city on the hill that dominates the Segre.
49 BC
Ilerda
Caesar defeated Pompey's lieutenants there: the battle decided the civil war in Hispania.
714–1149
Larida
Muslim city; the cathedral would be built over the mosque.
1707–1948
The barracks
After the War of Succession, the Seu Vella became a barracks, and it remained so for two and a half centuries.
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